I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.

The fact which the politician faces is merely that there is less honor among thieves than was supposed, and not the fact that theyare thieves.

Cold and hunger seem more friendly to my nature than those methods which men have adopted and advise to ward them off.

I have travelled a good deal in Concord; and everywhere, in shops, and offices, and fields, the inhabitants have appeared to me tobe doing penance in a thousand remarkable ways.... The twelve labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison with those which my neighbors have undertaken; for they were only twelve, and had an end; but I could never see that these men slew or captured any monster or finished any labor.

Cast your whole vote, not a piece of paper merely, but your whole influence. A minority is powerless when it conforms to a majority; but is irresistable when it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose.

What is the value of any political freedom, but as a means to moral freedom?

Who that has heard a strain of music feared then lest he should speak extravagantly any more forever?